


With Our Own Two Hands

by runovertome



Category: PRISTIN (Band)
Genre: Implied Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-24
Updated: 2017-06-24
Packaged: 2018-11-18 10:24:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11289342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runovertome/pseuds/runovertome
Summary: Slight AU. The world is not a nice place and Minkyung should know that by now.





	With Our Own Two Hands

[lonely.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbXV2R_Yd1E) 

* * *

 

She hears the squeaky door open, knows immediately which room that is for.

“Kyulkyung?”

Minkyung pulls her head out of the fridge where she had been choosing which face pack to put on, to see the younger girl in a rather short skirt and a little bit too much makeup to be going out for a late-night snack.

“O-Oh, unnie. You’re still up.”

Minkyung nods, having chosen the panda face pack, gives her a very obvious once-over.

“Going somewhere?”

She looks to the side, looks away, “Yeah.”

“Does the manager know?”

She thinks she might have seen Kyulkyung flinch a little, but she nods. Minkyung decides not to press it, because there is nothing to be gained from ratting her out. They can just talk about it another time.

She watches Kyulkyung slip into a pair of tall heels, listens as the door closes softly, then goes to the bathroom to put the face mask on.

* * *

Then the following day she sees the manager at the door when Kyulkyung is heading out, again at a ridiculously late hour.

His eyes widen when he sees her but Kyulkyung just shakes her head at him and they both disappear outside.

Her first thought is are you frickin serious.

It does not make sense for the girls to be allowed to date this early, especially not so soon, not right after their debut album, for christ’s sakes. Not that she thinks this is particularly nice, nor that she wants to have a dating ban because please, she is a human being with feelings as well, but seriously?

A dating scandal at this point in time could end everything. Especially one involving Kyulkyung. She should know better. Minkyung is certain she does know better, though perhaps young love blinds. Kyulkyung has never really struck her as particularly thoughtless though - perhaps a little silly, spending a little less time considering the repercussions of her actions, but never would any of the ten of them, this Minkyung is very sure about, never would they do anything that would jeopardize their futures.

So for her to do this is annoying.

Well, that and the manager seems to also be in on it, which makes it seem a little like playing favorites and Minkyung hates things that play favorites with a passion.

* * *

Next Minkyung finds the pill wrappers.

Now, to be clear she has mostly already pushed this all to the back of her mind, ignored it in favor of being at home for the past few days where she was visiting family, being a potato in the living room and letting her parents alternate between doting on her and telling her off for being lazy.

She likes to keep things tidy, though, so the first thing she does on her return to the dorm is to take out the trash and what else would fall out of the trash than birth control pills.

Now Minkyung is not personally on them, nor has she taken them, but she has seen enough of them to be able to recognize them.

It does not take her long to put two and two together and decide to talk to Jieqiong.

This is something she does not think she should talk to Nayoung about - Nayoung is a beacon of maturity in most senses but honestly it is difficult to place how open she might be with this and Minkyung does not want to get Kyulkyung into any more trouble than is strictly necessary.

She corners her after practice once, while the rest of the others have headed back to the dorm and it is just the two of them walking outside in the soft warm summer breeze.

“Kyulkyung,” she says softly.

The younger girl looks up from her phone, tongue flicks out to moisten her lower lip.

“Is there something you’re not telling me?”

A look of wild panic comes over her face and Minkyung is immediately reminded of how poorly she tends to keep secrets.

“I-I can’t say,” she whispers.

Minkyung slowly slides a hand over her shoulders, does not miss the way Kyulkyung flinches, files that away, “You know we’d understand, right?”

She shakes her head vigorously, almost makes as it to break out of Minkyung’s hold, which is not something Minkyung thought she would ever live to see, “There’s nothing to talk about, unnie.”

“It’s ok to be dating, you know.”

Kyulkyung’s head snaps up, eyes widened.

Minkyung shrugs, “I mean, it is. People date. Just don’t get caught. And well, don’t date an asshole.”

“I’m not-,” Kyulkyung freezes beneath her hands, “-I’m not dating, so can we please not talk about this anymore?”

Minkyung looks up to see the door to the dorm.

“Please?”

Minkyung pats her gently on the head then releases her. Kyulkyung enters the dorm without looking back.

* * *

“Minkyung,” the door to their room opens two days later and Kyungwon walks straight out to her on the couch.

Minkyung looks up from her phone and face pack, lets her eyes flick to the time. One in the morning is fairly early by her standards but most of the other girls are asleep. And Kyulkyung is out. Again.

“Let’s go out,” Kyungwon says.

Minkyung raises her eyebrows, feels the face mask stretch on her face.

“It’s one,” she points out the obvious.

“I can see that,” Kyungwon says, “but I need to get out for a while. You can come or you can stay but I’m going.”

Kyungwon can be stubborn but she is usually not nearly this forward nor demanding - and she usually sleeps fairly early, so this is somewhat of a surprise.

“The manager?”

Kyungwon rolls her eyes, throws Minkyung a hoodie and a face mask, “He’s busy.”

* * *

“What’s up?” Minkyung says, leans over the railing.

They have all picked up on Nayoung’s habits now, pacing up and down different parts of the Han River banks when they need to think. Today they are at Kyungwon’s favorite part, near where the ducks sometimes gather, where people like to walk their dogs in the day time.

Kyungwon just shakes her head.

“If you don’t have anything to say,” Minkyung rips a small stalk of grass to pieces, “I have something.”

Kyungwon looks over at her, strands of her blond hair fluttering out from beneath her hood.

“Have you noticed that Kyulkyung seems to be out fairly often?”

Kyungwon flings a stone with a lot more vicious force than Minkyung would have expected her to at two in the morning.

She waits for Kyungwon to say something, but instead Kyungwon flings another stone in with even more force.

After the third stone, Minkyung grabs onto her arm, “Hey.”

Kyungwon turns to her.

“W-Whoa are you crying?”

“No,” Kyungwon snaps, picks up another stone, “I’m not.”

She rubs her nose with a sleeve, sniffles, flings the stone in so hard Minkyung thinks she feels the water splash back up.

“Kyungwon,” she says, leans in, “Kyungwon, talk to me.”

“I can’t,” Kyungwon says but lets Minkyung stop her from throwing stones, “she made me promise. She made me fucking promise and I was stupid enough to agree because you’ve seen those eyes too, you know you can’t say no to them.”

* * *

They walk back to the dorm in silence.

“Minkyung,” Kyungwon says outside the convenience store, “let’s go in.”

“If we get caught outside snacking, we’ll never hear the end of it from the manager,” Minkyung whispers.

Kyungwon snorts, “He won’t care.”

Minkyung does not think he does not care but pads into the store quietly behind Kyungwon who is clearly in a mood to just do things and go places, Minkyung’s opinion be damned.

She sees Kyungwon scoop a large amount of strawberry-flavored snacks into the basket, almost none of the other kinds that she knows Kyungwon likes, shoots both the basket and Kyungwon a meaningful look.

“What,” Kyungwon says.

Minkyung shrugs, “You want some of the chocolate stuff too?”

Kyungwon’s lips turn up fractionally at the corners, “You’re the best, you know, RoRo.”

“You only say this because I’m paying.”

Kyungwon latches onto her arm anyway, and for the first time this evening Minkyung stops feeling discomfited.

* * *

“What is that,” Minkyung says a day later after she enters the smallest room in search of a book that Sungyeon really needs for school but left at the dorm.

Kyulkyung is sitting cross-legged on her own bed, concealer in one hand, dabbing at a spot on her thigh.

She freezes.

Minkyung takes in the full set of bruises, snatches the book from Sungyeon’s desk, eyes flashing, “I need to run but we will talk about this later.”

She has never seen Kyulkyung so frightened in her life but Sungyeon is still waiting outside for her book so this discussion will have to wait.

“D-Don’t tell anyone else? Please?”

Minkyung’s gaze hardens but she nods once, curt, and makes sure to close the door firmly behind her.

* * *

She returns back to the room, knocks once then lets herself in, closes the door behind her, locks it for good measure and does not miss the look of terror that crosses Kyulkyung’s face from where she sits on the bed at the furthest possible corner.

“I’m not angry at you,” Minkyung says, “well, fine, I’m not entirely angry at you.”

Kyulkyung tugs the blankets higher up towards her chin such that only her face peeks out from the top.

“I think I’d like to hear an explanation,” Minkyung says, anger simmered by now leaving only a hollow sense of helplessness and the thought that someone had hurt one of her nine sisters.

Kyulkyung’s hands tremble.

“Jieqiong-ah,” she says, uses Kyulkyung’s Chinese name. She knows this is cheating but never let it be said that Kim Minkyung is above using whatever legal tools she has to get what she needs.

Jieqiong’s head snaps up, she meets Minkyung’s eyes, then the tears start welling up and in an instant Minkyung is sitting by her, a sleeve for Jieqiong to grab onto and cry into.

“Jieqiong-ah, you need to find someone who will treat you right.”

She feels Jieqiong flinch in her arms, feels her freeze mid-sob then feels the crying start anew, this time with the shaking of Jieqiong’s head.

“I-I-”

Minkyung pats the top of her head, smoothes her hair gently, feels her own heart tremble because by god she does not remember the last time Jieqiong cried this hard.

“It’ll be ok,” Minkyung says, “just, whenever you’re ready, tell us who it is and we’ll go beat them up.”

Jieqiong hiccoughs, looks up at her with red-rimmed eyes, smiles sadly and nuzzles into her shoulder but says nothing.

Minkyung pats her again and forgets that she is supposed to be angry.

* * *

Jieqiong is out of the dorm again and Kyungwon is fidgety as all hell and Minkyung knows enough now to put two and two together so this time she drags Kyungwon with her to her favorite part of the Han River, a little section further upstream where the water hangs around in stiller pools, only occasionally disturbed by the stronger of waves.

“So,” Kyungwon says, “you’ve got stuff to say?”

“How long have you known,” Minkyung says to the water.

Kyungwon’s eyes flick over to her, “The last time we came here was the first day I knew.”

“And you knew that he hurt her,” Minkyung says, low and quiet, “I saw the bruises.”

The stone drops from Kyungwon’s fingers.

“B-Bruises?”

“She didn’t tell you about those?”

Kyungwon shakes her head, sinks to a squat, hands draped loosely on the middle the railing, “No,” she chokes out, “Jieqiong didn’t say anything about that. She didn’t say they-”

“They,” Minkyung says, “Kyungwon, what do you mean by they?”

Kyungwon looks up, reads the look on Minkyung’s face, closes her own eyes. Minkyung watches with a growing sense of dread at the closed-off look, eerily calm look on Kyungwon’s face, “Oh, you have no idea, do you.”

“You think it’s just one guy.”

Minkyung bites back the urge to scream as it sinks in.

* * *

Kyungwon has to hold her back as Minkyung lets the door open with more force than is necessary with a low hissed, “Don’t make this worse for her than it already is.”

Sure enough, the shower is on, the sound of water striking a mostly unmoving body and Minkyung really wants to scream or break something but there is nothing that would do for them right now so she settles with letting Kyungwon drag her onto the couch.

Jieqiong emerges from the shower at three thirty in the morning, does a double-take at the two of them sitting in the living room.

“H-Hey,” she manages.

Minkyung rushes up to her, engulfs her in a hug, does not miss the way she flinches and feels her own heart break, “I’m so, so sorry.”

Kyungwon pats her from the back.

Jieqiong does nothing to pull apart from the embrace, “There’s nothing to be sorry for, unnie.”

“If we were any better, any stronger,” Minkyung whispers into her hair, “if we were more popular, if we were more famous, there-”

Jieqiong pats the top of her head gently, “And that’s what we’re all working towards, Sungyeon writing songs, you holding us all together, me-”

Minkyung can feel the tremble in Jieqiong’s inability to finish that sentence, wants to wail but wailing will do them no good, no good at all.

“If only I could-”

“No,” Jieqiong says sharply, “no, don’t you dare say that. Don’t you dare say that. Just one of us, just one of us being-being,” she inhales, cannot say it, “is enough and I would never wish it on any of you all. I love you all too much.”

“Jieqiong,” Minkyung says, “oh, Jieqiong. You know we love you. We do, we do, we do, we just didn’t-I wish it wasn’t like this, I wish it didn’t have to be this way, I wish we could still-”

“Shh,” Jieqiong whispers, “don’t say anything else, unnie, or I’ll think about it and I really, really can’t afford think about it right now.”

Minkyung tightens the hug, cries tears of helplessness into the crown of Jieqiong’s hair, cries tears of frustration and rage into her own pillow later that night.

* * *

The next day, Minkyung slides into the recording studio behind Sungyeon and Yebin.

“What are you doing here, unnie?” Yebin flips one of her headphone cups back.

“I’m here to make this the best damned song Korea has ever heard,” Minkyung says, “now focus.”

The ends of Yebin’s lips curl up into a smirk. Jieqiong comes by to call them all out for lunch, eyes widen when Minkyung comes out of the studio behind the other two.

Minkyung pats her on the head.


End file.
